Friday, June 27, 2014

Fanny Farmer was an American candy manufacturer and retailer. It was started in Rochester, New York in 1919 and was named in honor of culinary expert Fannie Farmer, who had died four years earlier. In 1992 the Archibald Candy Company acquired the brand (and its 200 retail stores in the northeastern United States) as a sister brand to its own Fannie May candies (sold primarily in the Midwest and mid-Atlantic United States). Alpine Confections purchased both brands in 2004 after Archibald filed for bankruptcy, and merged Fanny Farmer into Fannie May. (source: Wikipedia)

There are several variations of this same basic Fanny Farmer design with the same number in the bottom right corner (7B-H459). The main difference is the font style used for "Fanny Farmer." One variation doesn't have the seal on the candy box the boy is carrying. This design was also used for Laura Secord Candies, a Canadian company.

The Library of Congress has the original 8x10 glass negative of the photo used on the postcard which can be found in their Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC) here.

Harriet Island is located alongside the Mississippi River near downtown Saint Paul, Minnesota. Free public baths were available there in the early years of the twentieth century. As pollution of the river increased, the popularity of the baths decreased.

Harriet Island is currently undergoing flooding due to heavy rains last week. The Mississippi River is expected to reach six feet above flood stage in downtown St. Paul this week.This video shows the flooding as of June 23, 2014.

Monday, June 23, 2014

Wisconsin — area 55,256 sq. miles, is an ideal vacationland, having within its boundaries over 10,000 lakes. Was admitted into the Union in 1848. State flower - Violet, Capital - Madison. rugged geological rock formations abound at Devils Lake, Wisconsin Dells, and the St. Croix River. Industrially Wisconsin is first in dairying and brewing and also is famous for cheese, steel and many other products.

Friday, June 20, 2014

June is Adopt-A-Cat Month. This Optimistic Miss postcard was published by Gartner & Bender and mailed in 1918. It is part of a series featuring this little miss and her cat, along with optimistic verses.

Saturday, June 14, 2014

The postcard above was published by Statics London and is titled "Tears of a Clown." The postcard does not identify the clown or poster. I learned from other sources that the clown on the poster is Lou Jacobs, and the poster is of 1940s vintage.

The clown face of Lou Jacobs (1903-1992) was used on the first circus stamp issued by the United States, the 5-cent American Circus stamp of 1966. That stamp was issued to honor the American Circus on the centenary of the birth of John Ringling. Ringling and his four brothers founded the Ringling Brothers Circus and later acquired the Barnum and Bailey Circus in London. The postcard below shows the Ringling Brothers, Barnum, and Bailey.

The United States Postal Service recently issued a sheet of Vintage Circus Posters Stamps featuring reproductions of eight vintage circus posters on May 5, 2014. The back of the sheet has a brief discussion of the history and purpose of circus posters.

Friday, June 13, 2014

This postcard shows President Bill Clinton, 42nd President of the United States (1993-2001), with First Lady Hillary Clinton and daughter Chelsea. I bought this postcard in Arkansas about twenty years ago when Clinton, a native and former governor of Arkansas, was President.

I chose to post this card today because of all the flags in the background. Tomorrow (June 14) is Flag Day in the United States. Looking at the card today made me wonder what the chances are of having the Clintons become "America's First Family" again.

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Glacier National Park is located in the U.S. state of Montana, on the United States-Canada border with the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. I took an Amtrak tour there in 1985. The tour was only about 5 days long, but it covered a lot of ground inside the park and involved stays at three historic hotels.

I bought a lot of postcards when I was at Glacier Park, but I prefer the older ones that I bought after I returned home. Most of the postcards in this post are from the late 1950s to early 1960s. The first two postcards were published by Great Northern Railway Company. Great Northern provided rail service to Glacier Park before Amtrak took over passenger service. The postcard above shows Great Northern's Empire Builder skirting the southern boundary of Glacier National Park. The postcard below shows great Northern's Western Star arriving at Glacier Park Station, eastern gateway to Glacier National Park.

My Amtrak train west from St. Paul, Minnesota also arrived at Glacier Park Station. It was a short walk from the station to Glacier Park Lodge, shown on the next postcard, where I stayed the first night.

The next postcard shows several red "jammer" buses in front of Glacier Park Lodge. These small red buses were used for transportation within the park. They were originally manufactured by the White Motor Company from 1936-1939 and operated in seven National Parks. The buses have roll-back canvas convertible tops. Yellowstone Park buses were painted yellow, while Glacier Park buses were all painted the bright red of mountain ash berries. Glacier National Park still operates 33 of their original buses today on the Going-to-the-Sun Road. The outside of the buses still looks the same, but the insides had to be rebuilt.

The second hotel where I stayed was the Many Glacier Hotel shown in the next postcard with some more jammers.

The next postcard shows a bus with the convertible top rolled back.

The next two postcards show the jammers traveling through the park on Going-to-the-Sun Highway. The vertical postcard shows St. Mary Lake. Below that is a view of East Side Tunnel.

My last postcard shows Lake McDonald Hotel on the west side of the park. Here I stayed in one of the cabins near the main lodge.

I took many photos on my Glacier Park tour. Since this post is focused on transportation, I will just show a few of my photos related to transportation. The train shown in the photos is the one in which I rode on my westbound trip. The red jammer is one of the originals on display in the park. The Belton Amtrak Station was at the west side of the park and was where I boarded the train for my trip home.

Saturday, June 7, 2014

This is an oversize (5" X 7") postcard with a picture of a stamp from the Classic American Aircraft stamp issue. A sheet of 20 different aircraft stamps was issued on July 19, 1997. The complete sheet is shown here.

The aircraft on this stamp is Amelia Earhart's Lockheed Vega. This is the plane that Earhart used in 1932 to solo non-stop across the Atlantic (from Newfoundland, Canada to Londonderry, Northern Ireland) and the U.S. (from Los Angeles to Newark, New Jersey ) – both firsts for a woman. The Vega was a favorite of pilots seeking to set speed and distance records. Earhart's Vega is on display at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. You can see a photo of the display and read more about the plane and Amelia Earhart here.

Friday, June 6, 2014

Mammy's Restaurant was located in Atlantic City at Boardwalk and Pennsylvania Ave. at the entrance to Steeplechase Pier. Mammy's Restaurant was most famous for donuts and waffles. The boardwalk-facing window allowed people to see the mechanized production of donuts being fried and sugared and then served to patrons in the restaurant or offered as take out. The restaurant closed in the late 1970s. (source)

Today is
National Doughnut Day which is celebrated on the first Friday of June each year. The Doughnut Day event was created by The Salvation Army in 1938 to honor the men and women who served doughnuts to soldiers during World War I. The doughnut (a.k.a. "donut") is an edible, torus-shaped piece of dough which is deep-fried and sweetened. Many American doughnut stores offer free doughnuts on National Doughnut Day. (source: Wikipedia).

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

The real photo postcards in this post do not have a common theme. They do have something in common, however. Masks were used to print the photos in various shapes against a plain white background. The photo printing masks were opaque sheets with openings of various shapes. They masked the border or background area of the print, allowing the image to be exposed only through the opening of the mask.

Sometimes the photo masks were sold in sets of various different shapes like those in the Manning's Masks ad. This ad appeared in a number of magazines in the early 1900s.

The next postcard is the only one other than the last oval one that has any identifying information on the back. It is labeled "Donald Partridge and Emmer."

Last, but not least, is a real photo postcard with an oval mask. Oval, circle, and rectangle masks were more common than the fancier shapes. This postcard appeared on my blog before here. It is a card I bought for the subject, not the shape. The others I bought mainly for the shape, not the subject.